Idiotprogrammer Blog

  • 1965 Project: Article Index

    1965 cover art

    For the month of November, I will be spending most of my time writing about 1965 (the year I was born). For that reason, I started the 1965 Project, which will consist of daily postings about overlooked gems from that year. To read these posts, start here.

    1965 Table of Contents

    1. It was a Very Good Year. (Introduction)
    2. Pawking Metaws (Bob Dylan)
    3. Kiddie Animation
    4. Unsettling Japanese Movies
    5. 1965 and American Politics
    6. Shindig! TV Show.
    7. Live Beatles’ Performances
    8. Children’s books of 1965.
    9. The Sound of Music Movie (and the 2 German movies that inspired it)

    If you’d like to make a comment about my 1965 posts, write it in the comment section below. If this is the first time you have made a comment, it won’t be approved immediately but will go into the moderation queue. Have no fear; I should approve it that same day.

    By the way, the bloggy part of this website is kind of a mess. This is temporary, and I’ll probably fix it in December.

  • RJ Geeky Explorations #17 (2026.7)

    See also: Previous  and Next (View all)

    Windows/Powershell

    While exploring the magic of yt-dlp, I realize that I really need to become proficient in Windows PowerShell. I don’t know why I waited so long to do that.

    Epub/CSS/Web

    I have recently made a lot of progress on my epub template. Now comes the hard/fun part: writing css specifically for the web. Theoretically I have already done the hard stuff on several different websites (see the long interview I did with Texas author Clay Reynolds). I just need to collect all the things I learned into one common template using the same style classes from my epub file.

    Speaking of epub css, I had an interesting revelation. Previously my css to manage images on epub had meaningful functional names. Eventually I realized that the context or the function of div + image mattered less than how wide I wanted the image to be on the display. So I changed my css classes to things like: div.image-float-right-50percent img and div.centered-image-35percent img (and variations of that).

    Suddenly everything was easier. In ebooks the only two things that matter for images are 1)what percent of the width should it occupy and 2)should it float or be centered as a block? At first, I thought I might need to do variations for float-right and float-left; maybe if I am designing a sophisticated interface or navigation aid, that would be necessary. But in most cases when you want to float something, you float it right. You could perhaps compile a list of float-left styles. But instead, I’m going to attach an id attribute to these HTML elements for those isolated cases so I don’t need to.

  • Robert’s Roundup #59 (July-Aug 2026)

    View Previous Roundup and Next Roundup (View All)

    MAILING LIST: I just started a mailing list for my publishing company. Will mail out every 2 months and will include excerpts from my Robert’s Roundup columns and other random stuff.  https://booktoot.club/@nagletx. (Mastodon) and nagletx.bsky.social. (Blue Sky).

    My Personville Press sells literary titles (mainly short stories) at budget prices (and several freebies). Gradually I have been doing “elevator pitch” videos on YouTube summarizing several of these ebooks in three minutes or so.

    Abbreviations: KU means Kindle Unlimited and NYP means “Name Your Price” (that’s an option on Smashwords and other booksellers). If you’d like to submit an ebook to me for review or mention in this column, see my instructions here. Here is my article about methods and search queries I use to locate ebook deals. See also: Indie Author Spotlight, Interviews by RJN,

    Introduction

    Here’s a Gemini AI query I did about non-Kindle ebook platforms globally. Here’s another AI query about whether kids have a strong preference for more recent children’s books over classics (and things their parents recommend). The answer seems to be yes, especially because more recent books have more graphics and have more diverse themes (like handling emotional regulation, racial diversity and eco-awareness).

    I never explained why I list some of my ebook purchases as Under the Radar and others as Blink and It’s Gone. Basically Blink and It’s Gone are ebooks which are rarely discounted. 90% of the time, these are books by known authors publishing by well-known publishers. In contrast, the Under the Radar titles are often by indie authors or self-published titles which I obtained either for free or for less than $1. In fact, some of the Under the Radar authors are very distinguished; sometimes a major publisher is publishing them, but for one reason or another, the prices are low and generally stay that low.

    Frankly though, I pay a LOT MORE ATTENTION to the indie authors on Under the Radar than I do with the Blink and It’s Gone authors.

    I produced two more “literary elevator pitches” for Jack Matthews ebooks. I show up myself in both videos near the end, but primarily it features Jack Matthews audio.

    Articles/Essays

    Some random reddit guy has been posting longish reviews of novels from each decade: the 50s, the 60s, the 70s, the 80s, the 90s.

    David Wallace-Wells has second thoughts about the recent Atlantic article about reading habits:

    You might assume, especially given social stereotypes and caricatures, that the reading decline would be concentrated among the young, with that turn away from books and toward phones therefore spelling doom for future literacy. You might think the problem would be exacerbated by schools and universities turning away from demanding reading curriculums and the arrival of artificial intelligence to do our reading for us. But in fact, young Americans are — according to this survey, at least — reading more than they did a couple of decades ago.

    In 2003, for instance, Americans ages 15 to 24 read 8.4 minutes a day; in 2016 they read 7.8 minutes a day; and in 2022 they read 11.7 minutes a day. Also in 2003, those between the ages of 25 and 34 were reading 9.6 minutes a day; in 2016 that group read nine minutes a day; in 2025 they read 10.2 minutes a day. If these numbers represent a crisis, it doesn’t appear to be a new one.

    Among Americans 65 and up, the base line is higher and the decline in time spent is larger, too: For decades, at least, the bulk of the country’s reading has been done by Americans in their golden years. In 2003, older Americans read on average just under an hour each day — 58.5 minutes. By last year, that had fallen nearly by half, to roughly 32.4 minutes each day, a drop that represents the lion’s share of overall reading declines. To the extent that we can talk about the decline of reading as a mass phenomenon, it seems concentrated not among the next generation but among the previous ones. The pattern may seem counterintuitive, but it echoes some other findings about social media use and disinformation: For all the hand-wringing about the effects of new technology on kids, the impacts may be just as corrosive, if not more so, on their grandparents. (Perhaps this is one reason The Wall Street Journal recently declared that “Dad Books Are a Dying Breed.”)

    Death of a bookseller/rebel. Lam Wing-Kee was a Hong Kong bookstore owner imprisoned and who later denounced mainland China for keeping him locked up for 8 months. Here is a link to a longer profile Alex W. Palmer did of him in 2018.

    Under the Radar

    Infinity in the Palm of Her Hand: A Novel of Adam and Eve By Gioconda Belli. Noted Nicaraguan journalist writes a meditation on the Adam-Eve story. Prolific author/poet rarely translated into English, but this FSG book was translated in many languages. PW wrote, ” The unfolding of knowledge and humanity is both primitive and breathtaking in Belli’s view. And without abandoning the timeless biblical story, Belli manages to introduce a modern Darwinian element that’s both stark and eloquent. Belli tackles Genesis with perception-rattling gravity. ” Alan Cheuse does a NPR review (with audio)

    Two books by W. Royce Adams (Home,) Scar Songs (short stories about males at various stages of life) and As Time Goes by (a reflection on aging). Amazingly, Adams is a 94 old retired English professor who started writing actively after retirement. He wrote several books for young readers including an adventure series based around a mythical place called Rairarubia. Here’s a reading of Adams talking about As Time Goes By (YT) Here’s a promotional vid about one of his Rairarubia books. (YT) Here’s a better organized list of his writing credits and awards.

    Blink and It’s Gone

    All We Know of Pleasure: Poetic Erotica by Women (Edited by Enid Shomer).

    Library Purchases/Printed Books

    Several collection of (public domain) folk tales by Cyrus MacMillan: Canadian Fairy Tales and Canadian Wonder Tales.

    Podcasts/Media

  • Music Discoveries 2026 July-Sept

    See also: Previous and Next (View all)

    See also my rateyourmusic profile, my list of favorite Name-Your-Price Bandcamp musicians ,  chart of my Music Album reviews.

    Articles and Interviews.

    Here’s another reason to love and rewatch Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Performances at the Bronze! Here’s Cibo Matto in a prolonged performance of Sugar Water. (YT). Here’s T.H.C. singing Wild at Heart. (YT). Here’s a YT playlist. (YT)

    Aha, T.H.C. (W) is the work of George Sarah (BC) and Sarah Folkman.

    Bandcamp, Etc

    I’ve been using Getmusic.fm and band.codes to download advance Bandcamp albums.

    Acquisitions via Gemusic/bandcodes

    1. Klaus Heinrich by Proffen. Great electric jazz, with female vocals. That opening title song is really catchy! (All the songs are similar)

    YouTubey Stuff

    This delightful nonsense duet song (From Three Little Words movie) shows Debbie Reynolds 2 years before Singin’ in the Rain came out. Reynolds was 18 years old at the time! (YT)

    Sammy Kane Kraft (W, Home) was an actress/athlete/musician who tragically died in a car accident at the age of 20. Here’s a great funky country song “Wasted” she performed at the LA Hootenanny (her last show).

    Her Soundcloud page still exists, and her brother Frankie Kraft made a multipart documentary about her life.

    I never thought that live versions of Cibo Matto Songs would do them justice, but here’s their 1997 live performance of Birthday Cake.

    In 2014 they released another album called Hotel Valentine. Here are two live performances they did at the time (Live on KEXP, Summer Sonic Japan 2014).

    Library/Freegal and Creative Commons

    I keep forgetting to mention that a lot of the audio from the Prairie Home Companion radio show is available at Archive.org. Here’s a link to 4 gigs worth of music (surprisingly diverse, even though the main performers dominate the audio). Here’s a smaller music archive. Here’s one of many compilations of comedy bits.

    My Amazing Music Collection

    You may already know that I have owned tons of music CDs and also have checked out a ton of CD’s from the library. I realize that it is slightly anachronistic to spend so much time accumulating music files, and sure it consumes a lot of time sometimes, but I have stumbled upon lots of amazing stuff. But honestly, I still haven’t listened to a lot of it, and often I listen to albums only once and then forget about it. So it’s probably a good idea to write about rediscovering albums already in my music collection.

    Here are some digitized CDs I have gotten into recently:

    Albums by Cibo Matto. Holy cow she is good and strange and jazzy and eclectic.

    Trance stuff by Jes. Jes sings a lot of tracks. She has a lovely voice, and she seems to produce her own tracks (I love Memento).

    Fastball. Iconic Austin rock band (whose song “The Way” is one of the most melancholy-nostalgic songs I have heard,

    Analog Africa albums. Some German company compiles lots of niche Africa bands from previous decades. Eclectic crate-digging stuff — always great.

    1965 Update

  • Social Media Linkdump July-Aug 2026

    See also:  Previous and Next (View all) (Bluesky | Mastodon | FB )

    Here’s a NYT tracker of lawsuits against Trump. I remain puzzled why there are no lawsuits about emoluments.

    Preliminary estimates suggest that the European heatdome/heatwave has caused 20,000 premature deaths.

    An EV expert surveys recent advances in EV battery technology. (YT) Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP) is significantly cheaper, and all cars are switching. It’s been around for a while, but it is being scaled up. China’s LFP has significant overcapacity in LFP battery. There are some new battery technologies (Sodium-ion, Lithium Manganese-Rich (LMR)Lithium-Air), but LFP is still going to dominate over the next decade.

    I have actually tuned in to several FIFA World Cup games this year. Fun and exciting.

    Highly recommend Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies, a sleeper historical drama, starring Tom Hanks.

    ROB REINER HAS A SURPRISE CAMEO! Surprised & Delighted to see Rob Reiner playing “George Washington” in a caustic political comedy sketch on Larry David’s new show. Have no fear. I predict within 24 hours it will be on YT and social media everywhere.

    Becoming Human — a website that compiles information about the earth and the emergence of life and humanity on this planet. Related: The PBS Eons show, which is about the fossil record, paleontology and ultimately climate science. I am frighteningly ignorant about this subject despite my curiosity. Here’s a complete YT playlist. Sadly watching these episodes through the PBS app is awful because of the mandatory intros. (You would think that they would show only once or twice and never again, but no, for a 10 minute segment, you get 1 minute of promos). The YT playlist when played in a browser with an ad blocker is going to be less painful.

    GENEVIEVE GUENTHER: What is more incompetent than pushing energy sources that underlie the high prices of food, electricity, housing, and health care? Coal, oil, and methane gas are expensive sources of energy whose pollution makes food scarcer, home insurance increasingly unaffordable, and collectively costs us $700 billion in health care bills annually. What was the point of the wars in Venezuela and Iran, but illegally securing oil reserves as payback for the American oil companies that gave him money during the campaign? What is more corrupt than the gutting of American science, once the jewel of the world, and destroying our capacity even to predict the weather for farmers, so that you can try to hide your lie that climate change is a “hoax”? What is more selfish and indeed criminal than knowingly destroying the only world we have for America’s children? (LInk). Guenther is a climate activist who wrote a great book (Language of Climate Politics) that combines climate science with rhetorical analysis.

    Occasionally I go to FB just to see what the algo wants to suggest for me In the past minute I just scrolled past 3 Spice Girls vid shorts. Help, I can’t resist.

    I used to be with ‘it’, but then they changed what ‘it’ was. Now what I’m with isn’t ‘it’ anymore and what’s ‘it’ seems weird and scary to me. It’ll happen to you! (This is a famous quote from the Simpsons by the Grandpa Simpson character)

    Here are 2 compilations of Muppets acknowledging that they are puppets: (First, Second ). “A puppet is controlled by a person whereas I am an actual talking frog.” Here’s a fascinating video (YT) about the technical tricks Jim Henson did to make them do incredible things, like ride a bicycle.

    NYT commenter about data centers: ” Data centers are not inherently toxic or irredeemably thirsty. The “water problem” is fundamentally an engineering choice dictated by local water pricing vs. local electricity pricing. When facilities are built with closed-loop systems or air-cooling, their direct local water impact drops close to zero. The friction occurs when large facilities rely on municipal drinking water and evaporative cooling in regions that lack the surplus water infrastructure to support them. So advocate for proper regulation of the construction of data centers. That is helpful. Opposing AI in general, based on water demands, is not well founded.”

  • RJ Geeky Explorations #16 (2026.5)

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    I’ve been focused on developing standard CSS for epubs as well as statically generated websites. Also, I hope to write an XML schema and write some XSLT transformations.

    Epub / CSS

    AI: Troubleshooting vertical gaps between HTML Elements.

    Two tools for creating/reading books with synced narration: Storyteller Platform and EPUB Media Overlay Editor (epub-moe) (Background).

    WordPress / Blogging / Webmastering

    Wow, i just realized that the default 2025 WP theme uses a font-style which is much too light for most readers. It’s somewhat hard to figure out where to make global changes to font in the theme.

    In WP-Admin, choose Appearance –> Editor –> Styles (under DESIGN) –> Typography.

    Then under Elements, select Text (or Headings, etc).

    Under the dropdown option, you can choose the variant of the font family which appeals to you for the font.

    Most WordPress themes come with two or three installed fonts (usually from Google Fonts). I’m not 100% sure, but I’m 98% sure that the installed fonts in WP themes are variable fonts (which can be customized on the fly — and are supported on most browsers, though not on ebook reading systems).

    For the 2025 theme, I was using Manrope font for text, but I was using the Regular variant (which is too light). All I had to do was switch from Regular to Medium and voila! That would change the variant of the font family globally to a darker and nicer Medium.

    AI Queries

    Here is Gemini’s answer about non-Kindle ebook platforms globally.

    Here is Gemini’s infuriating answer about why Google Play Books does not support break CSS (drives me crazy!)

    XML / XSLT

    Graphics/Multimedia

    YT dlp, a utility to help you download vids and audio from Youtube. There’s a web-based interface you can use, but I downloaded the command line program, used the presets to write my request and downloaded it locally fairly easily.

    I have been making some more literary elevator pitch vids.

    Are they better than when I started making them? Unsure, but I’m getting faster at making them.

    Up until now I spent a lot of time learning how to use Vegas Pro 19 and troubleshooting the idiosyncracies of the software on my middle-aged PC.

    I also used to spend a lot of time editing and moving clips into the right position so that the transitions didn’t look too terrible. You have to have a sense of timing and rhythm. Strangely, it’s easy to overedit out the pauses and breaks. I have to force myself to let things naturally. But you also have to sense which parts of the sequence is not accomplishing anything or dragging down the rest of the video.

    (Correction: While I generally agree that editing out the pauses of video looks awkward, you can easily edit the pauses of audio, and the resulting talk will be cleaner, cleaner and easier to follow Audio edits of speech are barely noticeable).

    I’m past that. Sure, occasionally I have problems, but I usually don’t spend much time on that. Here is what I spend a lot more time on:

    Writing the script. These elevator pitches have to be carefully scripted. First, they need to be reasonably interesting and succinct. Second, I usually am integrating several audio/video files into a single coherent script. It can be hard to do this and still keep the message coherent.

    Preparing the graphics. Perhaps other video editors make it easy to create graphics within the program. Eventually I realized that this was extremely tedious with Vegas Pro 19. It was much easier and faster to make slides using my preferred graphic program (Gimp for me) and then just import the finished graphic into Vegas Pro. For my last two vids, I ramped up my skill level a lot on Gimp (especially for the first and last slides). I do the credits almost entirely in Gimp. Sure, it may be nice to have video effects or animation, but is it really providing that much value?

    Selecting graphics to use as inserts. I learned quickly that the videos of myself are laughably bad and erratic. I need to do multiple takes and edit until I have the best take. Sure, I can edit out the crappy parts and if you juxtapose two clips together, it doesn’t look awful. But even though audio edits are almost invisible, video edits are still noticeable, and you should avoid these juxtapositions whenever possible. Instead, it’s better to go from a full size image to the start of the next clip. For that reason, it’s important to collect as many graphic inserts as you can.

    The challenge has to do with permissions and rights. I basically have no budget for clearance. If I put an image on my video for less than 2 seconds, a fair use case can plausibly be made. On the other hand, the last thing I need is a legal headache after production. Obviously it’s better to find no-cost media which are free to use in commercial contexts. But some kinds of media are highly unlikely to bring legal scrutiny. I’m almost at the point where I’d start subscribing to royalty-free media just to avoid the possibility of headaches.

    Decorations for Talking Heads. I use a lot of talking head shots of myself, and that quickly becomes tiresome unless you have inserts or cuts to something with more animation or motion.

    But you can liven a static video somewhat by adding graphics or text to the images. Vegas Pro has a Picture in Picture (PIP)video effect which allows you to add smaller graphics inside videos, and believe me, I have used this effect to the max! (By the way, I use this effect so much that I wonder why there isn’t an easier way to add it). Sometimes these PIPs are the only interesting thing about the video.

    Using/Making Transparent Images. Once you decide to overlay a lot of images over video, you face the problem of having to slice out the image out of the original graphic. You can’t be constantly overlaying rectangles of photos onto videos when all you need is a single element inside the rectangle.

    The end goal is to produce an image where only the element is visible and the rest of the picture is transparent. That means when you overlay the image onto the video, only the selected element will appear over the video. Note that images cannot be transparent if a)the image is a .jpg file or b)if the image in your editor lacks an alpha channel. So if you are manipulating the image in gimp, you probably need to be using an .xcf file (gimp’s native format) or a .png or .webp file.

    Therefore, I have had to learn a lot about how to slice portions of an image and add it to a video (or another graphic). Learning how to do this has probably been the hardest and most time-consuming part of using Gimp (my graphics tool). Here is the sequence of steps I have to do to slice an image out of a picture.

    1. Add an alpha channel to the original graphic.
    2. Figure out how to isolate/select the element you want from the original image. (More on that below)
    3. In Gimp, Turn on the Selection Window (under Windows) so that it appears in a dockable window.
    4. Use your selection method to select only the parts of the image that you want. (You may need to choose Select –> Invert to achieve that).
    5. Highlight the delete button to suck out the rest of the picture and leave it as transparent.
    6. Use Crop to reduce the size of your edited image even further.

    Selecting by Color. Probably the most common use case is removing the background of an image. If you are lucky, the contrast between the background and main element is clear. (If you generate the image from scratch using AI, all you need to tell AI to make the background of the image a certain solid color which you can easily remove).

    To do this, click the area of the background with the color, Select by Color and then press Delete. You might need to invert the colors.

    Alternatively, you can use the Path tool to draw around the borders of the element you want to select.

    1. Start adding a series of dots to surround the region you want to enclose. Be sure to add them consecutively (and right click to delete extra ones). Eventually the last place you want to place a dot is the first place you put a dot, so that will cause the region to be enclosed. (If it doesn’t connect smoothly, or if the dot goes off somewhere wild, you may need to delete dots or just start over). Press enter within the tool.
    2. Click delete (or Invert –> Delete) to delete the part outside the connected shape.

    In one case I had several regions which needed to be deleted. So I had to delete the regions one at a time. After you use the path tool to draw another shape around your second region, in path options, click SELECT FROM PATH.

    The key thing was making sure that the Selection Window is visible so you can verify that the second region is in fact highlighted along with the primary region. The selection window confirms which regions are being selected for deletion.

    Update: Select by Path is still a very clumsy way to make things transparent. But I found some of the paint tools like CLONE help smooth out imperfections of photographs.

    Removing a strip from the middle of an image and connecting everything back:

    1. Select the segment: Use the Rectangle Select Tool (R) to select the entire right segment.
    2. Cut it: Press Ctrl + X (or Cmd + X on Mac).
    3. Paste it: Press Ctrl + V (or Cmd + V on Mac). This creates a Floating Selection.
    4. Move it: Press M to activate the Move Tool. Click inside your pasted segment and drag it to the left until it abuts the left segment.
    5. Anchor it: Press Ctrl + H (or click the green anchor icon at the bottom of your Layers panel) to lock it back down into the main layer.
      In GIMP 3.2 for Windows 11, pressing Control + H acts as a toggle for your selection boundaries. It hides or shows the “marching ants” (the dotted lines) that outline your active selection. This lets you view your image clearly without those lines blocking your design.

    Honestly I have a hard time moving just the selected segment and then doing other functions (crop, clone, etc.). Some things I have noticed. If you are connecting two segments, one exists on a layer above the other; that may interfere with the ability to edit/overwrite portions of it. You can fix this by reordering the layer and/or checking the Sample merged option on Clone tool.

    Here’s another way to do it with Zealous Crop (I haven’t tried this before, but it makes sense)

    If the empty space between the segments is completely transparent (shows a gray checkerboard pattern), GIMP can do this instantly for you.

    1. Remove any active selections by pressing Shift + Ctrl + A.
    2. Go to the top menu and select Image > Zealous Crop.
    3. GIMP will automatically slice out the empty transparent strip and seamlessly snap the left and right segments together. [1, 2]

    I have noticed that despite cropping gimp will “remember” the deleted/hidden parts of the original image. I could not figure out why, so I ended up exporting from .xcf file to a .png file and/or flattening the image.

    Tips on Using Gimp’s Clone Tool

    1. After hitting the Clone tool, you should control-click on the region you want to start cloning.
    2. You can adjust the clone brush size to suit your needs (or even choose a different brush), but you can also change the angle of the clone tool. This makes it easier and smoother to overwrite diagonals.
    3. Sometimes Clone doesn’t work. To fix, Select None and/or change layer order.

    Set Up Your Target Layer (Best Practice)

    To keep your edit clean and non-destructive, you should clone onto a fresh, blank layer so you don’t overwrite your original artwork.

    • Step 1: Open your Layers Dialog (Ctrl + L).
    • Step 2: Click the Create a new layer icon at the bottom of the panel, name it “Cloned Elements”, and make sure it is filled with Transparency.
    • Step 3: Click this new blank layer to make it your active target layer. [1]

    3. Perform the Clone Action

  • Social Media Linkdump May-June 2026

    See also:  Previous and Next (View all) (Bluesky | Mastodon | FB )

    (Sorry, I was very late posting this social media linkdump. I forgot)

    Nataliya Gumenyuk on what it was like as a Ukrainian to report on U.S. politics:

    Today, it’s not just MAGA voices who demonize state institutions but also Silicon Valley libertarians. One of the leaders of the U.S. labor movement recalled to me a private conversation she had had in 2017 with Peter Thiel, the billionaire tech entrepreneur, venture capitalist and prominent libertarian thinker. For a while, she couldn’t understand why libertarians — or more broadly, radical free-market ideologues — were in such denial about climate change. But then it became clear: The climate crisis is not something even the wealthiest individuals or most powerful corporations can tackle on their own. It demands large-scale state intervention and international cooperation, which runs counter to their ideological rejection of collective governance and public regulation.

    What I see now in the U.S. is a profound inability to discuss seriously how the state can serve the public good. This conversation is still ignored, even by mainstream media, or is considered extreme. Proposals for universal health care — common in many industrialized democracies globally — are framed by many as radical or unaffordable. Efforts to cancel student debt are portrayed not as social policy but as moral hazard.

    …

    … There is still so much to admire in the country: the openness, the scale, the energy. But many Americans seem to live in timelines that never quite align with the present: Silicon Valley gazes into an unknowable future, while MAGA supporters are locked in conversations about a mythical past that never truly existed.

    A powerful taboo still holds: Few dare voice the idea that problems might be solved not by individuals or the market but collectively, through society and the state. The decline of local institutions — unions, public schools — is real. And while many I’ve met speak longingly of better days, they often can’t say when those days existed, only that they’re gone. It’s as if the ability to speak meaningfully about the present has been lost — making it harder to imagine a future grounded in real needs, shared purpose and equality.

    (This great essay comes from The Dial, an online zine devoted to personal reporting from around the globe. )

    On YouTube I’ve been watching this insane Australian spy-comedy called Danger 5. (View the Full Series here).

    Two TV shows. Watched Season 1 of For All Mankind, which is some of the best TV I’ve seen in ages. (Really compelling stories and characters). The great thing about it is that it’s not really about NASA and the moon, but about personal dreams and political ambitions. Also Deadloch, which is a crazy Tasmanian detective mystery involving lots of lesbian characters. Outrageous, lots of plot twists and outrageous comedy, great characters and genuine surprises at the end. (Also, the plots are so convoluted, but I don’t care; I’m just there for the ride). Update: Season 2 of Deadloch was equally inspired and hairy. Season 2 of For All Mankind has become more conventional, less interesting.

    30 minute vid reel (YT) of Ad Genius Joe Sedelmaier’s Funniest TV Commercials. (NYT Obituary)

    I’m pretty amazed that a substantial amount of the Prairie Home Companion radio show is on Archive.org

    Climate Scientist MICHAEL MANN on the American petro-state: “America has now become a petro-state, right up there with Saudi Arabia and Russia. And by that, I mean one of a handful of countries where our policies are almost entirely dictated by an entrenched fossil fuel industry. One can see the United States openly collaborating with Russia and Saudi Arabia to do everything they can to scuttle global climate action because it’s a threat to their business model. So Americans have to recognize—as uncomfortable as it is—that we are now a bad actor in this space. And by “we” I mean the administration that represents us internationally. There are many good folks in the US, obviously, who are very unhappy with the current regime and what they’re doing. But as far as the rest of the world is concerned, they look at the United States as a bad actor that they’re going to have to work around.

    “Consequently, we’re going to see Europe and other countries take the lead in fighting climate change. We’re actually going to see China, of all things, taking far more leadership in this area than the United States. And that allows the Chinese leadership to present themselves as similarly taking the high road when it comes to human rights, its treatment of ethnic minorities like the Uyghurs, the surveillance state and all of their sort of hegemonic behavior in recent years. So it helps situate China as the true leader in the world, while it helps to diminish the standing of the United States to the rest of the world. …. It’s ironic, isn’t it, that an authoritarian regime like China might be best-situated to act on climate. But because of the top-down structure of their government, their leaders can decide “We’re going to do this” and make it happen. They don’t answer to fossil-fuel industry lobbyists in the way that politicians in the US do.

    SUFFS (TONY-AWARD WINNING MUSICAL)ON YOUTUBE/PBS: (YouTube) This amazing/uplifting play retells the turbulent story about the women instrumental in leading protests to obtain woman’s right to vote in USA. Great music, great cast (starring Shaina Taub, who wrote the musical), it’s a moving & entertaining history lesson and raises question strikingly similar to those we face during the Trump era.

    According to the PBS website, this musical is available for viewing ONLY in May-June, so watch it before it leaves! I admit being unaware of almost all the events described in this musical, including the reluctance of Woodrow Wilson to push for it.

    The PBS streaming app regularly has award-winning plays and musicals: currently it has Kiss Me Kate, Top Hat, etc.

    As wonderful as British actor Anthony Head (RIP) was in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, he was also terrific as the harsh and narrow-minded Uther Pendragon (father of King Arthur) in the amazing 2008 British series MERLIN. The stories and actors were all first-rate, and it’s streaming now on Amazon Prime. (In that first episode, Head’s character Uther Pendragon will make you want to hate him! — thanks to Head’s performance.

    Various intellectuals on Trump’s birthday:

    CORY DOCTOROW: “Dear Comrade Trump: On this, the occasion of your 80th birthday, I write to extend my sincere thanks for all the work you have done. After decades of deadlock, you have inspired the world to action! You have done more to de-dollarise the world than any American leader in history. Without you, there would be no way that Ethiopia would be revaluing its national debt in yuan. You have done more to end the global dependence on oil than any leader (except, perhaps, for Comrade Putin). Without you, there would be no way that India would be chucking out its gas hobs and replacing them with induction tops. And, of course, you have done more than any president in history to end American dominance over the internet. Without you, there would be no way the EU would be racing forward with projects such as Eurostack and European Digital Infrastructure Consortium, with whole nations ditching American tech exports like Microsoft Office 365 in favour of free, open, auditable, transparent alternatives running on servers within the EU’s borders. Comrade Trump, you are, at long last, ushering in the post-American world, and a grateful planet salutes you!

    ****

    Siri Hustvedt: Dear Number 47. You’re ageing fast, Mr President, plagued by bruising, memory holes, verbal incoherence and unwelcome fits of sleep. Although plain to many of us who did not vote for you, your age and inevitable death have been invisible in the Magaverse.

    Maga magic transformed your real, fat, old man’s body into the spectacular body of fascism, American style: bulletproof, muscle-bound, eternal. The many superhero costumes worn by your 6 January terrorists were testament to that pathetic fantasy of invulnerability, no doubt helped along by the very real carnage of a global pandemic….

    …But time is inexorable, the citizens are restless, and your fantasy body is beginning to crack, just as your real body is showing the infirmities that come with 80 years of age.

    ****

    Bill McKibben: On the occasion of your birthday: It was unnecessary to launch a cruel, ridiculous war to convince the world of the benefits of wind energy, solar energy and so on. But you do deserve one small gold trophy as electric vehicle salesman of the quarter. Enjoy.

    Pew identifies a new spectrum of American political beliefs.

    But it doesn’t take into account the environmental movement which sometimes is embraced across the spectrum… and vilified by some pro-business types. I never fail to be surprised at the complete ignorance of most Americans about the subject of climate change.

    (I have created a Climate Change Cheatsheet which gathers my favorite links. But by far the best source of information is the Climate Primer prepared by Kerry Emannuel and MIT.

    NYT wrote about this viral tweet about NBA Championship between the NY Knicks and the San Antonio Spurs, and I gotta say: it’s brilliant!

    (That’s a reference of course to the reservation scene (YT) which is still one of the most memorable and entertaining clips from Seinfeld: )

    Robert Reich on the Ponzi scheme that is the SpaceX IPO:

    But many of us, if not most of us, with any savings parked in major stock indices (yours truly included) won’t have any choice. We’re going to end up investing in SpaceX whether we want to or not. That’s because the major indices have been rigged.

    Normally, major stock indices have a waiting period before they plow their investors’ money into a newly formed company, in order to test whether that company is worth it. But SpaceX has lobbied index funds to change the rules.

    On May 1, for example, the Nasdaq 100 implemented a new “fast entry” rule that will include companies among the top 40 most highly valued companies — which will almost certainly include SpaceX.

    Presto! A big chunk of Americans’ retirement savings and pensions (as well as university endowments) will automatically be tied to SpaceX’s market value. At the same time, all that automatic infusion of investment will artificially jack up the value of SpaceX, at least in the short term.

    But here’s the real kicker. SpaceX insiders — such as Musk and, reportedly, senior Trump officials — will be able to sell their shares sooner than is usually the case with an IPO, because that’s the way the IPO has been organized. Which means they can enjoy the stocks’ upward tide as the major indices force millions of investors to buy it, and then they can exit SpaceX before the tide goes out.

    From a reddit thread about Movie conventions which spoil the scene for you:

    • In war films any time someone says what they going to do when they go home, they always die.
    • When picking up a gun it makes clicky clicky sounds, even when the real gun just doesn’t.
    • Background actors dancing to obviously zero music and trying to do it as quietly as possible while the scene is going on.
    • People parking 30+ yards away from where they need to go. Just pull up to the damn house, meet up, murder site, etc.
    • Day for night
    • This may not apply, but every movie needs to have a scene to address why there is no cell service
    • Cars having no rear view mirror or headrests on seats. 
    • I like watching people type becuase they aren’t actually typing. Or texting.
    • Wilhelm scream. I wish no one had ever told me about it
    • A sound designer told me that he often added the sound of crickets in post for a night shot when there was extraneous noise occurring during a scene. From that point I noticed a lot of crickets during night scenes.
    • The office ladies podcast busted the “grocery bag” deal – bags of groceries are usually lighter than they’d be in real life, especially the classic paper bad with things sticking out the top – which often includes a baguette and carrot greens

  • Fun Trivia Questions

    Answers to all these questions are found here at the bottom of the same page.

    (I found these questions on a subreddit for Jeopardy fans. I’ve done light verification of these facts, nothing too in-depth. If any of the questions are seriously wrong, let me know!

    1. What animals were the Canary Islands named after?
    2. What is Michael J. Fox’s middle name?
    3. Which of these animals can see best in total darkness: a dog, a cat, a skunk, a human?
    4. Which US president was married to a woman whose first name was Eleanor?
    5. Which US state is geographically closest to Africa?
    6. What country has the longest land border with France?
    7. Who is the only male actor to win an Emmy award for the NBC sitcom “Friends”?
    8. Which major league baseball pitcher had the most wins but never won the Cy Young award?
    9. How many Qs are in the name of the capital of New Mexico?
    10. According to the 22nd amendment to the U.S. Constitution, what is the maximum number of years a person can serve as U.S. President?
    11. How many time zones are there in China?
    12. How many years was the Pony Express in operation?
    13. What’s the second biggest country in the world?
    14. Who was the youngest U.S. president ever inaugurated?
    15. How many letters are in the answer to this question?
    16. Who was the first Black American, (also the first person of African descent), to receive the Nobel Peace Prize?
    17. Which American president’s first language was something other than English?
    18. What planet is on average closest to Earth?
    19. (BONUS) A riddle: What is orange and sounds like a parrot?

    Random Trivia Facts

    If you live further than an hour from an ocean, you live closer to outer space than an ocean. (Read a longer explanation).

    In 2011, 165 years after its discovery, Neptune completed one orbit.

    Answers

    1. What animals were the Canary Islands named after?
      The answer is dogs. Ancient Romans reported finding lots of dogs on this island.
    2. What is Michael J. Fox’s middle name?
      Andrew. He did this because another actor in the Screen Actors’ Guild had the same name, so he did this to distinguish himself.
    3. Which of these animals can see best in total darkness: a dog, a cat, a skunk, a human?
      Nobody can see anything in total darkness (perhaps bats can “see” using echolocation).
    4. Which US president was married to a woman whose first name was Eleanor?
      Jimmy Carter. For anyone wondering, Eleanor Roosevelt’s first name was Anna.
    5. Which US state closest to Africa?
      Maine. (See this article). And if Puerto Rico ever becomes a state the closest state to Africa would still be Maine! By about 30 miles
    6. What country has the longest land border with France?
      (Brazil, with French Guyana)
    7. Who is the only male actor to win an Emmy award for the NBC sitcom “Friends”?
      Bruce Willis won 2000 Emmy for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series.
    8. Which major league baseball pitcher had the most wins but never won the Cy Young award?
      Cy Young
    9. How many Qs are in the name of the capital of New Mexico?
      Zero, it’s Santa Fe.
    10. According to the 22nd amendment to the U.S. Constitution, what is the maximum number of years a person can serve as U.S. President?
      10 (most people say 8)
    11. How many time zones are there in China?
      One.
    12. How many years was the Pony Express in operation?
      1.5 years, replaced quickly by the telegraph.
    13. What’s the second biggest country in the world?
      Canada.
    14. Who was the youngest U.S. president ever inaugurated?
      Many people reflexively say Kennedy. Theodore Roosevelt is the youngest person to become U.S. president, taking office at age 42 in 1901 following the assassination of William McKinley
    15. How many letters are in the answer to this question?
      Four
    16. Who was the first Black American, (also the first person of African descent), to receive the Nobel Peace Prize?
      Diplomat Ralph Bunche who won it in 1950 for mediating the Arab-Israeli conflict in the 1940s.
    17. Which American president’s first language was something other than English?
      Martin Van Buren who spoke Dutch as a child at home and learned English in school.
    18. On average which planet is closest to Earth?
      Mercury (Computing an average means that Venus’s trajectory on the opposite side of the sun is very far away from Earth while Mercury with a smaller orbit around the sun generally remains closer. ).
    19. A riddle: What is orange and sounds like a parrot?
      A carrot.

  • Robert’s Roundup #58 (April-June, 2026)

    View Previous Roundup and Next Roundup (View All)

    MAILING LIST: I just started a mailing list for my publishing company. Will mail out every 2 months and will include excerpts from my Robert’s Roundup columns and other random stuff.  https://booktoot.club/@nagletx. (Mastodon) and nagletx.bsky.social. (Blue Sky).

    My Personville Press sells literary titles (mainly short stories) at budget prices (and several freebies). Gradually I have been doing “elevator pitch” videos on YouTube summarizing several of these ebooks in three minutes or so.

    Abbreviations: KU means Kindle Unlimited and NYP means “Name Your Price” (that’s an option on Smashwords and other booksellers). If you’d like to submit an ebook to me for review or mention in this column, see my instructions here. Here is my article about methods and search queries I use to locate ebook deals. See also: Indie Author Spotlight, Interviews by RJN,

    Alphabetized Book Lists! This may sound like an obvious thing to do, but for my last Robert’s Roundup, I decided to alphabetize all the ebooks by author’s last name. I don’t have anything against alphabetization per se, but at the same time, I think that it favors the Adams over the Zelenskis. Actually I didn’t think too much about it, but eventually found it to be really really annoying to constantly be double-checking that I didn’t already mention a title (I have made that mistake several times before).

    Rant: AI Authors

    I saw a video of a small ebook distributor complaining about the number of AI-produced ebooks being submitted, and I guess that KDP and other ebookstores are experiencing the same problem. Today, an ad for one of my press’s ebooks was going to run on an ebook newsletter, but as it turns out, it appears alongside an “author” of sexy ebooks who published 10 ebooks in one year. (Humorously, the author photo on Amazon is a photorealistic portrait of a nude man with dangling penis. How on earth can real authors compete with the torrent of polished but low-quality ebooks being published today?

    I am actually fairly tolerant about using AI tools to produce stories as long as you are upfront about what is being done. For example, I think it makes perfect sense for an interactive story to be AI-assisted for some of the story branches — as long as a human supervisors and monitors for quality.

    But it becomes more difficult to advertise or to browse through titles if low quality AI titles are competing for your attention.

    Update. Now it appears that Draft2Digital is charging authors and publishers $12 a year who list their books because of the added burden of having to vet and weed out AI titles. Major bummer.

    Indie Author Spotlight

    the

    Under the Radar

    New World: a novel by Chris Adrian

    Secret Miracle: The Novelist’s Handbook. by Daniel Alarcon.

    The View from Highway 1 by Michael J. Arlen. (W) 1976 essay collection by a noted TV critic.

    In Darkness and Light by Tudor Alexander. (Bio) Here’s a video (YT) of his being interviewed for an earlier novel. Alexander is a Romanian-American who writes novels about the immigrant experience, starting from the end of WW2 to Cold War.

    A Better Angel: Stories by Chris Adrian.

    The King’s Rifle: A Novel by Biyi Bandele.

    Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ All-Time Greatest Hits a Novel by Mark Binelli.

    Nubian Prince: Novel by Juan Bonilla.

    Phantoms on the Bookshelfs by Jacques Bonnet, James Salter.

    Harder They Come: Gripping Survivalist Thriller of Fathers and Sons, Mental Illness and Violence in California by T.C. Boyle.

    This Three Pound Universe: Half a Life in 14 Quirky Essays by David Boyne.

    Through Stranger Eyes: Reviews, Introductions, Tributes and Iconoclastic Essays by David Brin. I’ve been following the blog of this sci fi novelist for a while.

    Jade Cat a Novel by Suzanne Brogger

    Serpent Box a Novel by Vincent Louis Carella

    An Archaeology of Sympathy: The Sentimental Mode in Literature and Cinema by James Chandler.

    Me Cheeta: The Autobiography by Cheeta (aka James Lever). A talking monkey who used to appear in movies recounts his Hollywood experiences. (This was nominated for a Booker!).

    Acceptance: A Novel by Susan Coll. Satirical story about college admissions.

    Cat’s Pajamas and Witch’s Milk by Peter De Vries. Also the Vale of Laughter.

    Hibernaculum by Anthony Doyle.

    Martin Duberman Reader.

    Dating Your Mom by Ian Frazier.

    Animal Husbandry and other fictions by Jeff Fleischer. (Home). He’s a Chicago-based journalist who mostly writes books about politics for younger audiences, but this is in fact literary fiction.

    The Process by Brion Gysin (W) Author who pioneered the cut-up method of fictional creation (which influenced William Burroughs). One reviewer called it “a rambling, breezy, keef-laced, picaresque tale ostensibly centered on a black professor self-exiled in the Middle East where he seeks…well, exactly what he seeks isn’t exactly clear. Truth, power, wealth, immortality, the ancient mysteries, the meaning of life–a continuing source of the best dope…or perhaps all of the above.”

    Snake on a Red Velvet Throne and other Stories by Bess Hendrick.

    St. Ivo by Joanna Hershon. (Home,) From a NYT review: “The book does not grant us a neat, circular ending, and Hershon is not afraid of ambiguity. But for me, these aspects function as a part of the novel’s charm: fiction full of complexity, devoted to reality.” Other writings 7 Fascinating books about cults. Writing and Improv Classes, For COVID reading, she recommended Everything is Under Control: A Memoir with Recipes by Phyllis Grant.

    Alt Sagas: Stories by Jean Huets. Speculative stories by poet and editor who also has published several books about tarot cards (!?)

    King and Raven by Cary James. Authorian tales.

    Ridley Inn: A Seaside Story by Tsvi Jolles (Home) A serious-minded fairy tale for children about a girl at a seaside inn.

    Void by Nathan Kuzack. (Home) Sci fi/fantasy story about an insurance worker who finds his world is vanishing (literally!)

    Facades by Eric Lundgren. First novel about a missing opera singer and her husband’s attempt to find her. (interview)

    Rembrandt’s Hat by Bernard Malamud (Stories). Always one of my favorite authors, this is a later collection. I’ve read Magic Barrel, but the Collected Stories has never been discounted.

    Birthright: A Near Future Novel by Max Malterer.

    Capacity: Poems by James McMichael.

    The Animal Claim: Sensibility and the Creaturely Voice by Tobias Menely. Literary study of 18th century poetry and how it affected politics and philosophy.

    Astonishing Splashes of Color by Claire Morrall. (W) Booker finalist about a quirky middle-aged lady coming to terms with death, miscarriage, marital issues. Title is Peter Pan reference to a woman who has “never has grown up.”

    Conscious and Verbal: Poetry by Les Murray. Famed Australian poet.

    Fracture a Novel by Andres Neuman. (W) Acclaimed novel by Argentine novelist about an elderly survivor of the recent Fukashima nuclear earthquake disaster.

    Bedlam Burning by Geoff Nicholson.

    Waterloo by Karen Olsson. (Austin-based author).

    40 Sonnets by Don Paterson. (Home, ). Lots of video readings and lectures: Readings, Sonnet Structure, Saints Talk: Why Bad Metaphors Destroy Everything, 1 hour reading,

    Everything belongs to the future by Laurie Penny. (Bio, substack)

    Scruffy Little Devils by Andras Polgar

    Story of B (Ishmael series book 2). by Daniel Quinn. Sequel to Ishmael book (which won a major literary prize in the 1990s). A priest is assigned to investigate a darkly charismatic preacher.

    Two humorous books by Terry Ravenscroft.

    You Wanna Get Outta Here by Andrew W.G. Rees. Canadian poet.

    God is a Tequila Worm by Tim Rousseau.

    The Scalpel and the Butterfly: The War Between Animal Research and Animal Protection by Deborah Rudacille. (Home, W), Informative and thought-provoking nonfiction book by a science author who graduated from the same JHU writing program that I did. All her titles sound great.

    Life in Culture: Selected Letters of Lionel Trilling by Lionel Trilling, Adam Kirsch. (NYT review) Includes letters to A. Ginsberg, Barzun, Edmund Wilson, Sontag, Saul Bellow, etc.

    Lavender by Michael J. Vaughn.

    Thirty Day Question by Joshua A. Walker. A suicidal man encounters a strange old man who offers a different perspective.

    Bit Between my Teeth: Literary Chronicle of 1950-1965. by Edmund Wilson. Essays, interviews, etc. Wilson’s Axel’s Castle was published in 1931, entering the public domain soon. I was a big fan of Patriotic Gore, his study of Civil War literature.

    Quiet Invasion by Sarah Zettel. I bought this scifi novel by mistake. Scientists discover an alien artifact on Venus, causing political disruption on the colony established there. Aha, I see from her domain that Zettel started out writing sci fi, but branched out into several different genres (fantasy, suspense, historical).

    Musical Brain and Other Stories by Cesar Aira. (W) A very highly-acclaimed story collection by Argentine author. “Aira, with his fuga hacia adelante or “flight forward” into the unknown, gives us imponderables to ponder and bizarre and seemingly out-of-context plot lines, as well as thoughtful and passionate takes on everyday reality. ” Another review says disparagingly, “This frustrating group of fantastical short stories strikes me as having great imagination but weak execution.” RJN: I plan to read this. Sounds like Man who Fell from an Airplane or Monterroso?

    Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl by Andrea Lawlor.

    Tremble: Erotic Tales of the Mystical and Sinister by Tobsha Learner.

    Wind-Up Bird Chronicles: a novel by Haruki Murakami.

    Endling a Novel by Maria Reva. Prize-winning novel

    Mabinogion Tetralogy: Prince of Annwn, Children of Lyr, Song of Rhiannon by Evangeline Walton. This translation of the famous Welsh tetralogy (which inspired Lloyd Alexander’s Prydain series of children’s books) is supposed to be highly readable.

    Mike Royko: The Chicago Tribune Collection 1984-1997 by Mike Royko. This ebook has 9900 pages and is the single largest ebook I have ever heard of. I’m a big fan of the newspaper columnist Mike Royko and plan to read at least part of the ebook.

    Library Purchases/Printed books

    the

    Creative Commons/Freebies

    the

    Literary Articles and Essays

    The Baffler has a long series of articles about the lack of financial rewards for the writing profession. Depressing and sobering because the contributors were by most standards extremely successful for their books, yet barely made enough to survive.

    NYT has a long series about How to Be Cultured. These are just annotated recommendation lists which by virtue of it being the NYT, seems important. (Time Magazine used to devote special issues on similar themes). The value comes from the big names they are able to corral who will contribute their favorites, with occasional surprises here and there. Here are AIDS-era novels, Books that Encapsulate 5 Countries, American Characters and Unsung works by Famous Authors. Also pretty clever: a list of book recommendations for each decade of life. For me, a 60 year old, It suggests Kindred by Octavia Butler and two public domain works by Nella Larsen: Passing and Quicksand.

    Here’s a nice profile of Siri Hustvedt and Paul Auster, the ultimate literary couple.

    Andrew Porter (Home, W) is a short story writer who teaches creative writing at Trinity. Here’s the title story from his 2023 collection THE DISAPPEARED, which is about a man dealing with the unexplained disappearance of his college friend. It’s a great thoughtful story (BTW, avoid reading the longish introduction by Kristopher Jansma (Home, W) until after you read the story itself).

    In a recent Bomb interview, AP writes:

    “In almost every story, the main character is having to face the fact that some version of life as they once knew it has disappeared and that they are no longer the same person they were at that time, and there’s a strange mixture of emotions that comes with this acceptance—confusion, fear, disorientation, sadness. I wanted to focus on characters grappling with these types of moments in their lives and wanted to present various ways of coping or coming to terms with these new realities. So that was the preoccupation in this book, but more generally, I think I just enjoy stories that explore absences and mysteries and unanswered or unanswerable questions. I’m intrigued by the idea of things that were once there vanishing, and what one has to do to accept and move on in their absence.”

    Rant

    On a self-publish reddit, a film critic and new novelist wondered why book reviewers respond to unsolicited review requests with requests for payment. He mentioned that such a practice would be unheard of in the film world. I wrote a long response:

    *****************

    That is not a common practice — though it does happen. More common is that book review services will charge a sum (50-500$) to do a sponsored review.

    Reading and reviewing a book takes a lot more time and effort than writing a review of a movie. At the same time, there’s a shortage of bona fide book critics who will read and review books compared to the number of books being published.

    I’m sure you know already that paying gigs for film criticism are rare compared to what it was 20 years ago. It’s even more rare for book criticism. Also, a higher percent of book critics are authors themselves — who often have better things to do than write reviews. Imagine if the sizable percent of people who wrote movie reviews were other film directors and screenplay writers.

    There are certainly ethical challenges in asking for money for reviews. But I certainly do not begrudge the meager compensation that book critics (or movie critics) feel that they are entitled to for their efforts. In many ways doing publicity for movies is a lot easier than doing publicity for books. Movies have shiny actors willing to promote the projects and easier access to multimedia tools. Books usually have just the author himself to talk about a book project. In the podcast world, I guess that authors make excellent guests — and that might put them on the same level as movie people. Generally though, book reviews are more crucial to a book’s success than movie reviews are to a movie’s success.

    Another thing. Although some movies have esoteric audiences, sometimes book genres are difficult for readers and even sophisticated readers to talk intelligently about. Reading a book that uses techniques or themes alien to you can feel like torture. But with movies, all you have to do is turn on the video player for 2 hours and pay attention and watch people and landscapes and listen to the soundtrack. I can hate the movie itself and still find the experience of watching the movie to be pleasant enough or relatively painless. I love books, and I finish a much higher percent of movies than books.

    (By the way, I looked up the original poster, His name is Marty MacDaid (Home, Substack) and he has written Murder in Beltova, (KU) a murder mystery with a Baltic theme.

    Capsule Book Reviews